Where Mountains Explode in Fire and Rock...
Written: Jan 08 '06
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Product Rating:
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Pros: On a clear day, you can see forever...
Cons: Nope.
The Bottom Line: A trip to Irazu is an easy, inexpensive, yet utterly fascinating look at a temporarily dormant but still potentially explosive volcano. Cool!
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| mrkstvns's Full Review: Irazu Volcano National Park |
"Pura vida" is the fundamental Costa Rican buzz phrase, used for just about any purpose cool and positive. Most folks probably assume that it comes from the country's spectacular green spaces, places that truly put the "diversity" into "bio-diversity". Good assumption, but it's not just the flora and fauna that are alive in Costa Rica --- the whole terrain is too, with constantly shifting tectonic plates lying just below the ground surface, causing a minor earthquake to happen somewhere in the country on a daily basis. Those tectonic plates also cause mountains to transform themselves into volcanoes, spewing fire, lava, and ash for miles around.
There are more than 100 volcanoes in Costa Rica, most dormant, but a few that serve as constant reminders that nobody should ever assume that they are completely safe on any Costa Rican mountain (after all, it was only about 30 years ago that Arenal went from "dormant" to "explosive" overnight, destroying the village of Tabacon along with it, and creating one of Costa Rica's most popular tourist draws --- though some folks say that the nightly displays of spewing fire and flowing lava are less impressive today than they were a couple years ago).
Irazu isn't spewing anything these days, and hasn't since the lava flows stopped in 1965, but one shouldn't be too comfortable in the fact that today, hundreds of tourists make their way to the summit ever morning to see the craters and witness first-hand the kind of surreal moonscape that a volcano leaves in its wake.
Irazu is likely to erupt again one of these days, after all, it has for as long as anyone can remember.
Tour guides tell visitors that the first known eruption was in 1723 --- but what the tour guides should tell you is that 1723 was the first time a Spaniard witnessed Irazu blowing its top. The indigenous people who lived in Costa Rica before the first European conquistadors showed up were already calling the mountain "Irazu", which in their language, meant something like "thunder place". I'd say they had known about quite a few eruptions prior to 1723...
The volcano is still active, and the molten magma is bubbling unsettlingly close to the surface. Geologists monitor the volcano, and it's public knowledge that the water in the crater lakes tends to be warmer than bath water, and one wall of the volcano averages about 180 degrees Fahrenheit. Even strolling along the blackish grey beach sands below the park's visitor center, you feel a steady warmth emanating from the ground. The place isn't one of cold rock...especially considering the air temps around you.
If you go all the way up to the summit (not just at the visitor center), you'll feel an intense chill as cold winds buffet you and you pull your jacket just a bit tighter. (You did bring a jacket, right?) Even on warm December days when the average temperature in Cartago, at the base of the volcano, is in the mid 80s, it's going to be more like low 40s up on the summit. Nighttime temps drop below freezing, and early morning visitors often see frost on the ground near the summit (which is a bit over 11,000 feet).
About the Park...
Irazu Volcano National Park is essentially the peak of the mountain. At a bit over 2300 hectares, t's not a huge park, and the area that visitors would visit is the area around the craters themselves.
The most prominent features are the two big craters: the main crater (Crater Principal), and the somewhat smaller and lower Crater Diego de la Haya. Both of these craters tend to have small lakes in their basins, though the lake in Diego de la Haya sometimes turns red (due to minerals bubbling through it as volcanic gases vent below its surface) and it sometimes disappears completely (if you look at my photos, you'll see that the Crater Principal has a good-sized turqoise lake in its basin, but Diego de la Haya has only traces of water remaining....and December is the beginning of the dry, or "summer" season in Costa Rica).
If you do park in the visitor center parking lot, I urge you not to miss the trail or the road up to the summit. At the summit, there's a disused and crumbling observation platform, but everyone seemed to be ignoring the beaten down barrier tape to keep people out, so I went on up to the top along with all the other scofflaws. This is probably the vantage point where folks say you can see both the Pacific and Atlantic oceans --- and sometimes even Lake Nicaragua --- on a clear day. It was pretty darn clear the morning I was there, and I was there in the early morning, when you supposedly get the best vistas, but maybe I have weak eyes because I didn't see anything but mountains as far as the eye (at least my eye) could see. Not that I was disappointed in the scenery, it's still spectacular!
The Crater Principal is 1050 meters across (about 2/3 of a mile) and 300 meters (about 1,000 feet) deep. Crater Diego de la Haya is 690 meters across and 100 meters deep. Crater Principal's basin is almost completely volcanic rock, while Diego de la Haya has a basin surface of ash and fine black volcanic sand.
Guide books can generally be counted on to talk about the "lunar landscape" look of the park, but in truth, there's a fair amount of basic vegetation popping up in nooks and crannies, and you find a lot of lichens and you find areas with the big floppy elephant ear plants that seem to be common across much of the country. Still, there's not much flora or fauna in this particular national park. Unlike most of Costa Rica's parks, it's the ground that's alive up on Irazu...
Getting To Irazu...
Want one guess as to what the most visited park in Costa Rica might be? It's Irazu...
A big reason for the park's popularity (aside from being a cool place to see) is that it's sooo easy to get to from anywhere in Costa Rica's Central Valley. Just head to Cartago, then take up the road up the mountain to Irazu. That's it. (Along the road, you'll pass through a couple villages....check out the gigantic volcanic boulders that punctuate the landscape).
There's a ranger station at the park entrance where you'll have to pay US$7 to enter, then it's no more than a couple hundred yards to the parking lot at the visitor center.
The visitor center has a snack bar and gift shop, and there's also rest rooms (although in December 2005, the rest rooms were being renovated and port-A-pots were available instead of "modern" conveniences).
Most folks come to the park in tour buses from various San Jose area hotels. Almost every hotel in Costa Rica has a travel desk and will make tour reservations for you to see just about anything anywhere in the country, and if there isn't a tour going where you want, they'll call Interbus for you to arrange for you to get there anyway.
The easy way to visit Irazu is to just the folks at your hotel that you want to see Irazu. They'll hook you up and a tour guide will show up on whatever morning you specify to whisk you and a dozen or so soon-to-be friends up the mountain on a half-day or full-day excursion.
Of course the downside to the tours is that there's often the overhead of stops you don't really want, and you're on somebody else's schedule instead of your own, so the other "easy" way is to simply call a taxi and go on your own. You're going to have the taxi busy for at least a few hours, so it probably won't be cheaper than the tours, in the long run, but you go when you're ready and stay as long as you want.
Hit It On the Way Out of Costa Rica...
A lot of the flights from Costa Rica to the United States leave in the late afternoon. I must have seen 50 different people on the various travel boards asking for recommendations for short, half-day things to do on their last day in Costa Rica.
Irazu would be a great option...
The best time to visit the park is early in the morning (afternoons are often cloudy). The park entrance opens at 8am. If you catch a taxi from San Jose between 7 and 7:30am, you're up at the park early, you have a couple hours to stroll around the craters, then can take a leisurely brunch at one of the scenic overlook restaurants on the way back down the mountain. The taxi should have no problem getting you over to the airport by early afternoon.
Bottom Line...
Arenal is the more dramatic volcano, with its constant lava flows and fire and smoke visible for miles, but volcanoes like Irazu show folks how Arenal is going to look in a few years, after the fires die down and it becomes safe to tread the mountain without fear of instant incineration.
Irazu's advantage is that it's close to San Jose and convenient to get to from any of the towns of the Central Valley. It's an amazingly scenic place with dramatic vistas and a viewpoint on an entirely different side of "pura vida".
I recommend Irazu thoroughly.
Until next time, see you on the road. As always, look for me in the cheap seats!
A Photo is Worth a Boatload of Words...
I've put a few of my snapshots of Irazu up on my website (all taken December 2005). Hope you enjoy 'em!
http://www.tiogringo.com/irazu.html
Closely Related Reviews...
Epinionator JAMES23 wrote an inimitable review of one of the scenic overlook restaurants on the road up to Irazu. I second his recommendation to stop in and check it out --- the views of the valley and the steep farmlands on the lower mountain are stunning.
Here's a couple other reviews of things to see and do in the region...
* Monteverde Rain Forest
* San Jose
* Costa Rica National Parks
Recommended:
Yes
Best Suited For: Friends
Best Time to Travel Here: Dec - Feb
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